‘It’s not that strange,’ said Pip. ‘My grandparents from my first dad are German. “It’s sausage to me” is an everyday German saying. It just means I don’t care .’

‘Or you’ve got a sausage fixation,’ Lauren laughed.

‘Says the daughter of a porn star,’ Pip quipped.

‘Oh my god, how many times? He only did one nude photoshoot in the eighties, that’s it.’

‘So, on to boys from this decade,’ Cara said, prodding Pip on the shoulder. ‘Did you go and see Ravi Singh yet?’

‘Questionable segue. And yes, but I’m going back to interview him tomorrow.’

‘I can’t believe you’ve already started your EPQ,’ Lauren said with a mock dying-swan dive back on to the bed. ‘I want to change my title already; famines are too depressing.’

‘I imagine you’ll be wanting to interview Naomi sometime soon.’ Cara looked pointedly at Pip.

‘Certainly, can you please warn her I may be coming around next week with my voice recorder app and a pencil?’

‘Yeah,’ Cara said, then hesitated. ‘She’ll agree to it and everything but can you go easy on her? She still gets really upset about it sometimes. I mean, he was one of her best friends. In fact, probably her best friend.’

‘Yeah, of course,’ Pip smiled, ‘what do you think I’m going to do? Pin her down and beat responses out of her?’

‘Is that your tactic for Ravi tomorrow?’

‘I think not.’

Lauren sat up then, with a snot-sucking sniff so loud it made Cara visibly flinch.

‘Are you going to his house then?’ she asked.

‘Yeah.’

‘Oh, but . . . what are people going to think if they see you going into Ravi Singh’s house?’

‘It’s sausage to me.’

Pippa Fitz-Amobi

EPQ 03/08/2017

Production Log – Entry 3

I’m biased. Of course I am. Every time I reread the details from the last two logs, I can’t help but hosting imaginary courtroom dramas in my head: I’m a swaggering defence attorney jumping up to object, I shuffle my notes and wink at Sal when the prosecution falls into my trap, I run up and slap the judge’s bench yelling, ‘Your honour, he didn’t do it!’

Because, for reasons I don’t even quite know how to explain to myself, I want Sal Singh to be innocent. Reasons carried with me since I was twelve years old, inconsistencies that have nagged at me these past five years.

But I do have to be aware of confirmation bias. So I thought it would be a good idea to interview someone who is utterly convinced of Sal’s guilt. Stanley Forbes, a journalist at the Kilton Mail, just responded to my email saying I could ring any time today. He covered a lot of the Andie Bell case in the local press and was even present at the coroner’s inquest. To be honest, I think he’s a crappy journalist and I’m pretty sure the Singhs could sue him for defamation and libel about a dozen times over. I’ll type the transcript up here straight after.

Oooooh booooooyyyyyyy . . .

Transcript of interview with Stanley Forbes from the Kilton Mail newspaper

Stanley:

Yep.

Pip:

Hi, Stanley, this is Pippa, we were emailing earlier.

Stanley:

Yep, yeah, I know. You wanted to pick my brains about the Andie Bell/Salil Singh case, right?

Pip:

Yes that’s right.

Stanley:

Well, shoot.

Pip:

OK, thanks. Erm, so firstly, you attended Andie’s coroner inquest, didn’t you?

Stanley:

Sure did, kid.

Pip:

As the national press didn’t elaborate much further than reporting the verdict and the CPS’s later statement, I was wondering if you could tell me what kind of evidence was presented to the coroner by the police?

Stanley:

A whole bunch of stuff.

Pip:

Right, could you tell me some of the specific points they made?

Stanley:

Err, so the main investigator on Andie’s case outlined the details of her disappearance, the times and so on. And then he moved on to the evidence that linked Salil to her murder. They made a big deal about the blood in the boot of her car; they said this suggested that she was murdered somewhere and her body was put in the boot to be transported to wherever she was disposed of. In the closing remarks the coroner said something like ‘it seems clear that Andie was the victim of a sexually motivated murder and considerable efforts were made to dispose of her body.’

Pip:

And did DI Richard Hawkins or any other officer provide a timeline of what they believed were the events of that night and how Sal allegedly killed her?

Stanley:

Yeah, I do kinda remember that. Andie left home in her car and at some point on Salil’s walk home, he intercepted her. With either him or her driving, he took her to a secluded place and murdered her. He hid her body in the boot and then drove somewhere to hide or dispose of her body. Mind you, well enough so that it hasn’t been found in five years, must have been a pretty big hole. And then he ditched the car on that road where it was found, Romer Close I think it was, and he walked home.